= On Wed, Oct 14, 2015 at 4:40 PM, Robert Drehmel <robert AT zoot DOT drehmel= .com> wrote:

Hi.

When (e.g.) routing 5mm power traces on a small grid, it's not always e= asy to hit the
point where the trace ended (which is the center of the semicircle at the e= nd of the
line) to start the next line.=C2=A0 If you have selected the line tool, fin= ding the end of
the line can become guesswork as the cursor doesn't change shape like i= t does with the
select tool.
I want my traces to consist of lines and arcs that are perfectly connected = and I want
to work as fast as possible.

Attached is a small patch that

=C2=A0- makes it possible to deactivate snapping to "some sensible poi= nt along a line".
=C2=A0 =C2=A0(that's what a comment in the code says). This snapping al= gorithm gets in the way
=C2=A0 =C2=A0sometimes so you have to slowly go over a line to find out whe= re it really ends,
=C2=A0 =C2=A0bouncing back and forth between the points of the small grid, = the end of the line
=C2=A0 =C2=A0and these "sensible points", which is wasting time. = The command is
=C2=A0 =C2=A0"Display(ToggleSnapOffGridLine)". It is still activa= ted by default to avoid
=C2=A0 =C2=A0violating POLA.

=C2=A0- more importantly, introduces a new command called "Display(Tog= gleHighlightOnPoint)"
=C2=A0 =C2=A0that highlights all lines and arcs which have (end)points exac= tly on the position
=C2=A0 =C2=A0where the cross hair is currently snapped to. It therefore hel= ps finding the end
=C2=A0 =C2=A0points of lines and arcs, but sometimes also shows redundant t= races, traces that
=C2=A0 =C2=A0aren't perfectly connected to each other, traces that don&= #39;t end directly on the
=C2=A0 =C2=A0center of a via but should, etc. It works with thin draw too a= nd I tested it with
=C2=A0 =C2=A0gtk and lesstif.

I use the second option mostly in conjunction with deactivating the first. = Both commands
have been added to the menu by means of (g)pcb-menu.res.in and are availab= le as command
line options as well.
Caveats:
=C2=A0- The HID API expects all HIDs to make a copy of the color string whe= n setting a color.
=C2=A0- The function that lightens up a color could be improved.
=C2=A0- I used it for a while, but after porting it from my local fork, it = probably needs
=C2=A0 =C2=A0more testing.

Maybe someone else finds it useful.

Sounds like it's hitting a problems that annoyed= me for a long time, I'll try it for sure thx

Britton

=C2=A0